Why do processes never decrease in size?
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They never releases the memory utilized
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They release the memory but kernel does not use them
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Since they are running
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It’s a false statement
Reveal answer
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Correct answer
AI explanation
When a process frees memory back to its own heap/allocator, that memory is often retained by the process (for reuse) rather than being returned to the operating system kernel, so the process's reported memory footprint doesn't shrink. This is a common behavior in memory allocators like glibc's malloc, which keep freed memory around to satisfy future allocations rather than releasing it back to the OS immediately.